ᴄʜᴇʀʀʏ ʙᴏᴍʙ: ᴀɴɴᴀ ꜱᴛᴀʀᴋ ①

one

february, 2008

anna sat cross legged on the floor next to her father in his lab, loud rock music blaring in the background. 

"socket wrench." he held out his hand, and anna placed the wrench in his open palm. 

tony screws in the final board and looks over at his daughter. "go boot this old hotrod up for me, will ya peanut?" 

"'kay!" the eight-year-old scurries to the front of the car and slides in the driver's seat. "ready?" 

tony gives her a thumbs-up. anna smirks and turns the key fob, and the engine whirrs to life and both father and daughter cheer. anna runs back to her dad, who picks her up and twirls her around. "we did it!" he says.

"heck yeah we did!" anna giggles, and they high-five. 

then, the engine short-circuits and cuts off.

"damn it." tony whispers.

"damn it." anna mocks, grinning. 

"rascal." tony shakes his head and puts his daughter down. "jarvis, gimme the exploded view." 

"the compression in cylinder three appears to be low." the a.i replies, and anna sighs. 

"we should've checked those." 

"i did!" tony defends.

"well obviously not enough." anna rolls her eyes and reaches into the engine, looking at the spark plugs. "these need fixing too, dad. if you ever want this car to run you're gonna have to take care of it." 

tony wrinkles his nose. "well excuse you anna maria, i take perfect care of this car." 

anna rolls her eyes and reaches down for a screwdriver. "i'll work on the spark plugs and you get the cylinders." 

"yes ma'am." tony salutes, making anna giggle. 

just then, the music cuts off and tony's assistant, pepper, walks through the door. she was on the phone, her heels clicking loudly on the marble floor. tony shoots anna an annoyed look and the girl laughs, going back to unscrewing the spark plugs. 

"please don't turn down my music." tony says, not looking up from the car. 

pepper hangs up the phone and turns to tony. "you are supposed to be halfway around the world right now." 

"how'd she take it?" tony asks.

anna's facial expression turns to one of disgust. she was kind of sick of her dad bringing home women. 

"like a champ." pepper sighed. 

"why you trying to hustle me out of here, trying to steal my time with my daughter?" 

anna looks up from the car and shoots her dad a look, only receiving a smile in return. 

"your flight was scheduled to leave an hour and a half ago." pepper says.